In article , ARBermudez3{at}yahoo.com
says...

>Matthew Johnson wrote:
>
>> But how can you believe it is so close to pure, that it was better
>than any of
>> the Greek manuscripts? The difference between this claim and "the
>Vulgate was
>> pure" is too small for this to be a good defence for you.
>
>It isn't close to pure.  My point, my only point, from the start, has
>been that the Roman Catholic Church made the vulgate the official text
>because it was the best text available at the time(a point we continue
>debating).

Well, I am glad that you finally recognize what we are still debating. For no,
it is NOT true that "it was the best text available at the time".

>> [snip]
>>
>> >I never claimed the Vulgate would be superior today, only that it
>was
>> >superior to anything else being used at the time.
>>
>> And that claim too, is false. For it _already_ had the Byzantine
>mixture that
>> you criticize so harshly in the Greek manuscripts.
>>
>
>I already said it was mixed.

That you did. But you miss the point: you criticize harshly and dismiss out of
hand the Greek manuscripts for the _very same fault_.

>It is a question of degree.  Compared
>with the other texts available - and availability is key -the vulgate
>was better.

No, this is not true.

>> When I said 'original', I was NOT referring to the _autographs_. Of
>course they
>> had disappeared. But I see you snipped w/o comment where I made this
>point more
>> clear. SO why are you still refusing to see it?
>
>The question remains:  Can you point to Greek manuscript in use at the
>time that was superior to the vulgate?

And I already answered that. Remember: the books you complain were missing in
1739 etc. may not have been missing at the time period we were discussing.

They also might not have gone missing if not for the _neglect_ the Latin world
showed for the Greek manuscripts from the 7th through the 15th centuries!

>> >  No because
>> >there are no "originals."  Any Greek manuscripts
that were being
>used
>> >were Byzantine and corrupt.  There was no "breezy dismissal."
>>
>> But that sentence of yours IS "breezy dismissal". That
is why we are
>still at
>> loggerheads here. It is simply NOT TRUE that "Any Greek manuscripts
>that were
>> being used were Byzantine and corrupt." Where did you _think_ Codex
>Koridethi
>> and 1739 came from?
>
>Yes, Codex Koridethi is not Byzantine, but it is mixed to the point of
>not fitting into any specific text-type

That is GOOD, since none of the specific text-types have an a priori claim to be
closer to the autographs than the mixed manuscripts do.

> and we are not even sure if
>Koridethi was produced by someone who knew more than a little Greek!

That is not necessarily so bad, especially if the corrector was good, or if the
underlying text can be reconstructed despite copyist errors -- which is very
often the case.

>Koridethi contains only the Gospels, but lacks parts of Matthew.

It lacks Matthew _now_. But not when it was originally copied.

>1739 is not Byzantine either, but it is hardly pure and also does not
>fit into a specific type.

Again, so WHAT? If we _had_ the autographs, they would not fit into a specific
type, either.

>1739 also lacks the Gospels and may never
>have included Revelation.

If it was copied for reading in Church, of course it did not have Revelation.
You asked for single manuscripts, it was unusual for them to contain the entire
NT.

>Neither is more accurate than the Vulgate.

You don't know that. And I doubt it very much. After all, NONE of these had that
awful, shameful interpolation, the Johannine Comma in 1 John 5:7.

Once again: that gross fault was enough to render ALL the copies of the Vulgate
far inferior to the vast majority of Greek manuscripts.

>> [snip]
>>
>> >> Because no, the RCC did _not_ "need ONE official
text". That was a
>> >fiction of
>> >> the over-legalistic Latin mind.
>> >
>> >And you talk of bigotry!
>>
>> Yes, I do. It is NOT bigotry to point out that over-legalistic
>mindset of the
>> Latin world. On the contrary: this is well known, and sometimes even
>admitted
>> _within_ the Latin world. See, for example. Fr. Seraphim Rose's book
>on the
>> position of St. Augustine in the Orthodox Church, where he defends
>his cult
>> against certain rash detractors who wanted to deny that St. Augustine
>was in
>> fact a saint of the Orthodox Church.
>
>Do you realize how ridiculous you sound?

You should be posing that question to yourself, especially after misreading me
so badly.

>  So just because a members of
>a certain group use offensive terms to characterize themselves,

No, that is NOT what I said. Can't you read?

> does
>that mean that we should all use those terms in relation to that group?
> It's bigotry.

And that is not what I said either. Go read it again and try again. And if you
still can't see that I did not say that, then give up.
>
>
>>
>> >> Because it is absurd on the very face of it to canonize a
>> >_translation_ to the
>> >> neglect of the original, especially when the very reason for
>> >_translating_ the
>> >> Vulgate in the first place was to _avoid_ this error!
>> >
>> >Original language does not equal original text.
>>
>> I never said it did.
>
>You are claiming that Greek manuscripts are superior to the Vulgate
>simply because they are written in Greek.

Again, I NEVER said this! What I said was that it is absurd to elevate a
translation _above_ the original language, even if the manuscript tradition in
the original language has problems. I also said that in this case, the Greek NT,
the problems in the manuscript tradition are nowhere NEAR as bad as you make
them out to be.

>  You are not taking the
>accuracy of those manuscripts into account here.

Oh, yes, I am.

[snip]

>> >Actually, I don't have to.  It is enough to know that the Vulage was
>> >more accurate than the Byzantine manuscripts being used at the time.
>>
>> But this isn't even TRUE!
>
>You have not yet demonstrated this.

You miss the point. It was YOU, not me, who claimed the Vulgate was more
accurate. Stop shifting the burden.

>> >> 2 - even if they wer ethe most accurate then available, the
>scinece
>> >of textual
>> >> criticism was still in its infancy. IN fact, St. Jerome _was_ one
>of
>> >the
>> >> founders of the art. It is only later that we learned how to apply
>> >the art well
>> >> to Scripture.
>> >>
>> >
>> >A point I made in my orininal post.
>>
>> But you seemed to promptly forget it with your hyperbolic praise for
>the Vulgate
>> and the decision to make it the official text.
>
>Saying that the Vulgate was the best text available at the time is not
>hyperbolic.

Yes, it is. Jerome did not have access to very many manuscripts. Believe it or
not, Jerusalem was somewhat of a backwater in his day.

>  For you to call it so is hyperbolic.

But I did _not_ "call it so". You did. Thanks for recognizing that it is
hyperbolic, even if you had to get so confused that you can't remember who is
being hyperbolic;)

>> >> 3 - Even when the Greek original is _completely_ lost, it is STILL
>> >FALSE that
>> >> "the Greek original counts for nothing". And
St. Jerome knew this
>> >very well.
>> >> That is why the Deuterocanonicals are included in the OT even
>though
>> >their
>> >> Aramaic originals were (or still are) completely lost, yet modern
>> >editions rely
>> >> on scholarly reconstructions of the 'Vorlage'. You should read St.
>> >Jeromes'
>> >> prefaces to his translations of the OT books.
>> >>
>> >
>> >Your point is well-taken, but you still seem to be confusing
>original
>> >language with original text.
>>
>> If you still think that, then you do not yet understand the point.
>>
>> > St. Jermome went with the best text
>> >available.
>>
>> That is FAR from clear. Although he may have had access to many
>choices that
>> have since disappeared, he did _not_ have the principles of modern
>textual
>> criticism to guide him, nor did he know about the Diatessaron and Old
>Syriac. It
>> is simply _not possible_ to establish the "best text" with such
>limits.
>
>Again, Jerome went with the best text available - available being key.

No, this isn't true either. And how _could_ you know that it is true, anyway? He
never did tell us which manuscripts he used, nor have scholars been able to
reconstruct his Vorlage.

So you must be talking through your hat, making things up out of the whole
cloth.

>I never said Jerome went with the best text of all time.

But he didn't even go with the best of his _own_ time. How could he?

[snip]
>> More racist slander. Yes, it is you who are the bigot, not me, as you
>make clear
>> with this slander.

[snip]

>Racist?  Since there are only three races

Who told you this? Try looking the word up in a dictionary.

> and the people we are writing
>about share the same race, it can hardly be called racist.

No. You just don't understand _either_ word, 'race' nor 'racist'.

>Can you point to Sinaiticus actually being used in the textual
>tradition you have written about?

That would be a rather specialized question of textual criticism.

>Sinaiticus was in existence at the
>time of Trent, but it was neither used nor available.

What _are_ you talking about? It was not available to _Rome_. That is not the
same thing. If Rome had not arrogantly insisted that the Greeks were schismatics
and heretics, Sinaiticus and _many_ other manuscripts might have been made
available to them. But as it was...


>> You are still twisting my words. I never said that their saying that
>corrupt
>> manuscripts should not be used was the bigotry. I said that the
>decision that
>> the Vulgate alone was incorrupt was bigotry. Can't you READ?
>
>You have yet to produce viable alternative to the vulgate.

Not true. I gave two alternatives. So what if neither of them were complete? By
following their example, it would have been possible to construct a text MUCH
closer to the autographs than the Vulgate. But no one (among the Latins) was
interested in doing this, so it didn't happen.

> Since the
>other texts available were more corrupt and therefore should not be
>used, how can it be bigoted to say that only the Vulgate should be
>used?

You are asking the wrong question. For you keep on basing your question on the
same WRONG assumption, namely, that the others _were_ more corrupt.

[snip]

>The fact remains that you still cannot point to a text available at the
>time that was superior to the Vulgate because in practicality no other
>textual tradition was using such texts.

No, no such 'fact' remains. 1739 and Koridethi were _both_ superior, despite
their missing books. Put those together with a few similar manuscripts and even
in the time of Trent, it would have been possible to construct something very
similar to today's UBS, maybe better. But it never happened, because Rome could
not be persuaded to take the Greek seriously: the Pope's delay of the
Complutensian Polyglot proves this also.


-- 
---------------------------
Subudcat se sibi ut haereat Deo
quidquid boni habet, tribuat illi a quo factus est.
(St. Augustine, Ser. 96)

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